1. Field
The present invention relates generally to display devices, and particularly to immersive display devices comprising a plurality of adjacent flat panel displays and an arcuate cover sheet positioned proximate the flat panel display.
2. Technical Background
As digital imaging technology rapidly advances, viewers of images on digital displays demand higher and higher image quality and a contemporaneous increase in the level of virtual reality that they experience through the display. Indeed, viewers wish to attain the feeling that they are actually in a virtual 3D space at least in part through the way the images they are seeing are displayed.
One approach to attaining improved virtual (visual) reality was to present a digital image on a digital display with a wider aspect ratio, such as a 16:9 aspect ratio, as compared with a conventional CRT display aspect ratio of 4:3. Although the 16:9 aspect ratio has been used in presenting feature films in theaters and has been well received when applied in home-use digital displays, viewers continue to demand even better virtual (visual) reality.
To continue to improve virtual reality experiences, another approach to advance the technology has been to place a plurality of displays in an array (sometimes referred to as “tiling” the displays) to increase the apparent size of the aggregate screen. As illustrated in FIG. 1, one such configuration is to place three conventional flat panel displays 10 side-by-side (for example, each with a 16:9 aspect ratio) in a linear array to increase the effective aspect ratio (e.g., to 48:9 or other aspect ratios). The goal of such an approach is to provide the viewer with such a wide screen that portions of the image picked up by his or her peripheral vision adds to the effect that the viewer is actually in the virtual space. While this approach yields some improvement in the virtual reality experienced by the viewer, there is one rather glaring disadvantage; namely, that the adjacent peripheral edges of the displays that comprise the bezel 12 introduce discontinuities into the aggregate screen, interrupt the visual flow, and reduce the viewer's virtual experience. Although users may cope with the discontinuities by focusing on the image content to the best of their ability, the visible bezels 12 nevertheless remain a significant and undesirable part of the experience.
Another conventional approach to improving virtual reality experiences is to employ a large, curved screen and project the image onto the screen with a projector. While bezel discontinuities may be reduced and/or eliminated in projection systems, such systems require a rather significant amount of space to locate the screen and projection equipment, which is highly undesirable for many applications, such as home entertainment environments.